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Originally Posted by The_Dunedan
I would say that Democracy is nearly always wrong. Democracy is the rule of the Mob, the rule of the Charismatic over the Righteous, of the Persuasive over the Correct. The French Revolution is a good example of Democracy in action, as is the Russian Revolution.
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I'd say that those revolutions were actually Anarchy in action, not Democracy. You assume that a majority of people in France or Russia wanted a revolution, and/or participated in that revolution. This is just wrong; the Russian revolution in particular was organized and carried out by a (relatively) small group of people, supported by a larger group of people that "simply wanted change"; even this larger groups was unlikely to be anything like a majority of the population IMO.
But ultimately, both revolutions replaced a dictatorial system with a more democratic system of government, albeit with a period of extreme violence in between. Hence, if these were indeed examples of Democratic revolution, the results were positive (eventually). Therefore, the examples are not as negative as you seem to imply.
Interestingly enough. there are not many true democracies in the world. The Swiss may have one of the purest democratic political systems, and there, it does indeed lead to some very "strange" laws, sometimes inspired by pure nationalism and bigotry (Not unlike laws passed in other political systems).
Most democracies are actually parliamentary democracies, where the people choose representatives to rule the country. Not unlike the US Republican system, I might add... The main difference is probably in the amount of power the President has; in a republic, he rules the country, in a (parliamentary) democracy, he is a figurehead.
Furthermore, when you suggest that a majority could choose to kill minorities, you ignore the fact that every democratic country in the world has systems in place (laws, etc) to prevent exactly such an abuse of power.
Without those checks and balances, a democracy could choose to become violent, but that's highly unlikely to happen. Given that most humans prefer to have a quiet, peaceful life, it is unlikely they'd choose to go into a civil war; they have to be persuaded by demagogues to do so, and then... it's not a democracy anymore, it's becoming a totalitarian state! But again, that possibility doesn't only apply to democracies, because it can (and does) happen in every political system.
I'd say historical evidence suggests that democracies, once in place, are typically less likely to start a (civil) war than any other political system... .